Focal Electra 1038be

Petro85

Petro85

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Couple questions on these. First what's the deal with focal. Did they used to be jm lab ? And change or something. . I'm confused with that whole thing.

Most important question is : anyone have any sort of experience with these. Awhile back I was going to buy jm lab Electras . They sounded fantastic but I can't Find the ones I heard and I can't remember the model number. These look awful nice though.
 
Yes the company used to be called Focal-JM Lab and now it goes by Focal. French speaker company. They hit it big with the Focal Utopia Be line on the high end. Their Electra line also got very good reviews in the mid-priced segment. The Electra 1038Be has a lot of DNA from the higher priced Utopia series of speakers, especially the Berrylium tweeter and I think also shares the same midrange drivers. The difference is size and build level of the enclosures as well as components in the crossover.

Reviews of the 1037Be (predecessor) and of the 1038Be:

Focal Electra 1037 Be loudspeaker | Stereophile.com
Focal Electra 1038Be Floorstanding Loudspeaker Reviewed

View attachment hifi-plus 1037Be.pdf
 
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I listened to the 1038s several times when considering an upgrade from the Dynaudio C1s.

It's an excellent value, and a very good speaker. The tweeter can be a little bright, depending on the room and associated gear. I'm not sure about Manley, but I know it sounds terrific with Hegel and other "smoother" or warmer solid state components. I did not try it with tubes.

If you like the KEF sound, I think you would also enjoy the 1038 and find it a nice upgrade. One thing I did notice is that there are many great deals on Focal to be found on Audiogon. Not sure why.
 
Thanks for the info guys. I'm just fishing around . It's going to be a long hard journey to buy speakers. Start the research now . When I'm ready ill kinda know which way to go. There's just too many out there to make it an easy choice.
These seem real nice
 
Yeah, it is confusing. I have a pair of Tantal 509s when they were just JM Labs. At some point they decided to alter the name to Focal. My pair has the inverted titanium tweeter. Very nice lively accurate speaker for it's size and the $700 it cost many years ago.

 
Focal tags the 1038s port as "front laminar port" but it's similar to downward firing port. Quite easy to position. Match that beryllium tweeter with class A amp (I use Pass) and you get all the sparkles there is without sibilance or fatigue. Very seductive midrange. A lot of characters from Utopia line (compared with Scala and Diablo) Electra Be 2 line has been in production for about 7-8 years says a lot about the line.
 
Listened to a set of Focal Electra 1028be's this week. What a great speaker. After hearing them I don't understand why these are not more popular. They were very smooth and seemed like a speaker you could listen to all day, perhaps lacking just a smidgen of detail you get with some other speakers. I compared them today to Dynaudio C1, Dynaudio Focus 260 and Dali Rubicon 6. I could easily own any of those speakers but liked the Focal's the best.
 
BeerCan said:
Listened to a set of Focal Electra 1028be's this week. What a great speaker. After hearing them I don't understand why these are not more popular.
Click to expand...

Me neither. Plus they have the look.
 
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